What Brad Pitt Got Out of Going To An All-Male Alcoholics Anonymous Recovery Group

“You had all these men sitting around being open and honest in a way I have never heard,” he said
- by
Evan Romano

06 Sep
2019

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Brad Pitt is feeling on top of his game, emotionally, after opening up to an all-male recovery group.

The star of the upcoming space dramaAd Astraopened up about his sobriety in alengthy interview withThe New York Timespublished Wednesday. Pitt reportedly spent a year-and-a-half in Alcoholics Anonymous after his split from actress and filmmaker Angelina Jolie. (A fight on a plane about his drinking habit was reportedly the "final straw" in the couple's relationship.) "I had taken things as far as I could take it, so I removed my drinking privileges," Pitt told theTimes.

In AA, Pitt was part of a recoverygroup that consisted entirely of men. Pitt told theTimeshow moved he was by the men he met, noting their vulnerability.

“You had all these men sitting around being open and honest in a way I have never heard,” the actor said. “It was this safe space where there was little judgment, and therefore little judgment of yourself.”

The group proved both trustworthy to open up to, and to have an exceptionally strong bond with one another.So strong, in fact, that no one in the group sold the Pitt's story—or the fact of his mere presence—to the tabloids.

As a result, Pitt was able to keep his self-improvement as private a matter as he wanted, and got a new personal experience in opening up to others, and using that to feel better.“It was actually really freeing just to expose the ugly sides of yourself,” he said. “There’s great value in that.”